No Arrests Two Years After Greek Journalist's Murder

Giorgos Karaivaz

With no reported progress or clues two years after the murder of Greek investigative journalist Giorgos Karaivaz, gunned down outside his Athens home, media freedom groups are calling for authorities to provide answers.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) suggested, amid complaints that Greece has been stifling press freedom, that police and the New Democracy government have not been prioritising the case.

“Do the Greek authorities have something to hide about the murder of a reporter who specialized in police corruption? It is unusual in Europe to see an investigation of this kind make so little progress,” Pavol Szalai, RSF's EU-Balkans desk head said.

Jamie Wiseman, Europe Advocacy Officer at the International Press Institute (IPI) told Blueprint for Free Speech that while police have said they can't make public any leads that, “We have not seen clear updates about any progress made since then, leaving his colleagues and his family in the dark.”

He added that a government task force formed in 2022 “should make solving this murder a key priority. Until those responsible for his killing – from the hitmen up to the masterminds – are prosecuted, journalists in Greece will continue to fear reprisals for their investigative work.”

Sotirios Triantafyllou, President of the Panhellenic Federation of Journalist's Unions, told Blueprint for Free Speech that, “The solving of that crime is very important for us. It is a matter of honor not only for the journalistic unions in Greece, but for the journalistic unions internationally.”

ESIEA, the union of journalists of Athens, has dedicated the year 2023 to Karaivaz's memory and hung a banner on the face of its headquarters with his photo and the message: “20 Bullets Kill The Democracy.”

RSF said that Europol “could not only provide technical assistance but also ensure that the investigation is independent,” suggesting that there are questions to be answeed.

Five months after Karaivaz' murder, the police had lists of suspects, statements, security camera footage and details of phone calls. Nevertheless, RSF believe the investigation has hit a dead end.

Europol, which can take action only with the agreement of a nation’s authorities, was invited by Malta and Slovakia to assist the investigations into Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia’s murder in 2017 and te death of Slovak journalist Jan Kuciak in 2018.

After a 2022 appeal from RSF, a European parliamentary delegation visited Greece in March and said there was “no visible progress in the police investigation” and that Europol should be brought in.

Concerns raised over investigation

After the murder, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis promised a “swift resolution, but the lack of progress on the case has media groups wondering if the cause is due to links between Karaivaz's work investigating organised crime and police corruption.

A coalition of media freedom partners in the Council of Europe's Platform has pushed Greece’s government “to urgently bring to justice all those responsible for this abhorrent murder and to provide more transparency about the investigation.”

They said “It is wholly unacceptable and deeply saddening that the case must now be categorized as an instance of impunity for murder,” especially coming after repeated criticisms the government has been stifling media freedom.

Karaivaz was an experienced reporter who worked for the TV channel STAR and ran a news website focusing on crime and policing. He was shot in broad daylight as he came out of his car, by a gunman riding behind a motor scooter driver.

Following the killing, police said the ‘professional’ style of the assassination indicated the involvement of organized crime, the groups said, but P M Mitsotakis' vow to find the killers quickly went nowhere.

Media freedom groups have been frustrated by the lack of information coming out of the Greek investigation.

Other countries facing similar issues have done better in moving the justice process forward. In The Netherlands, nine suspects have been arrested in the daylight shooting of investigative reporter Peter R. de Vries in Amsterdam three months after Karaivaz's killing.

In Greece, “The lack of communication by state authorities around the criminal probe has led to uncertainty and deepened the chilling effect of the assassination on the journalistic community,” the press freedom groups said.

“Karaivaz’s assassination represents a low point for press freedom in Greece. Every day without progress in the investigation and prosecution further tarnishes the reputation of the authorities responsible,” they added.

They noted that a confidential police report containing evidence of connections between high-ranking police officers and organized crime was leaked to the media in February.

Triantafyllou said, “There is link between the murder of Giorgos Karaivaz and his work, they killed him to stop his journalistic investigation … i was a message against the journalistic investigation. It was a message to scare journalists.”

Ioannis Michaletos, an Associate of the Institute for Defense & Security Analysis (ISDA) in Athens told Blueprint that the answer why the killers haven't been caught is likely simple.

“For sure they were professional hitmen who appear to have covered their tracks … also it it appears that the brains behind the murder are well connected and Mafia-like types.”